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Neanderthal Seeks Human (Penny Reid)

There are three things you need to know about Janie Morris: 1) She is incapable of engaging in a conversation without volunteering TMTI (Too Much Trivial Information), especially when she is unnerved, 2) No one unnerves her more than Quinn Sullivan, and 3) She doesn’t know how to knit.

After losing her boyfriend, apartment, and job in the same day, Janie Morris can’t help wondering what new torment fate has in store. To her utter mortification, Quinn Sullivan – aka Sir McHotpants – witnesses it all then keeps turning up like a pair of shoes you lust after but can’t afford. The last thing she expects is for Quinn – the focus of her slightly, albeit harmless, stalkerish tendencies – to make her an offer she can’t refuse.

I’ve had this book on my kindle for awhile now, and given that it has great reviews and all, I decided to finally pick it up. Somehow this wasn’t exactly what I was expecting, though I still enjoyed it.

I found the writing a bit dense, this had in part to do with Janie’s (the main character) rants, but it mostly just dragged a bit, and I think that the overall book could have been cut a bit short.

I really liked Janie, it’s great to see an “atypical” woman represented. She’s an introvert, and she struggles with the act of socialization and general interactions with other human beings, doing it mostly for others and because she knows some of the benefits of it. As an introvert myself, it was awesome to read about her. But her awkwardness around people leads her to spill some very random facts about the world and everything in it, and those moments were hilarious.

Unfortunately I wasn’t all convinced about Quinn. I liked how he understood Janie and literally chased her and did everything in his power to show her how good they were. BUT, I felt like he purposely deceived her for longer than necessary, and although he struggles to change later on, the fact that he’s the type of guy who orders your food without even asking first, just doesn’t fly with me. He had his good and funny moments though, and he made Janie a lot happier, so points to him.

I also found the whole knitting group a bit too much and sometimes unnecessary. To be clear, I liked the concept, because I understand that’s the connection between all the books, but there were too many characters introduced, and while they were very different from each other, they weren’t relevant enough for the story for me to be actually invested in them.

The plot had some weird moments and to be 100% honest, I didn’t really like the conflict and I’m not even sure I understood why it came to be.This made me like the book a little less, though the action itself was fun.

All in all, this was a fun romantic comedy, but I’m in no hurry to pick up the rest of the books in this series.